A Journal of Mahatma Gandhi Antarrashtriya Hindi Vishwavidyalaya

Short Story
BUDHIA
Ramvriksha Benipuri
Translated by
Mangal Murty
All of a sudden, a goat-kid came frolicking, and started nibbling and
chewing the soft, supple leaves of the chameli plant. I hadn’t by then
developed the aesthetic sense to be totally entranced by the merry
prancing of that little beauty, joggling her long ears in each which way
as it nipped arid munched the lush leaves, looking hither and thither
with her large black eyes as it chomped on, and also occasionally bleating
meyn-meyn, as if calling its mother-goat. Rather, that day I felt such
pity for the delicate chameli sapling which I had brought with great care
from the neighbouring hamlet and which I had planted with my own
hands, watered it, and felt delighted to see its tiny leaves budding forth
each day. But this little rogue had now undone all! Furious with anger
I tried to hit it hard. But like a swift doe it leapt away, as I ran chasing
it.
‘Don’t hit it, Babu.’ This was Budhia. A small girl of hardly seven
or eight years. A red rag with several patches wrapped round her waist,
barely covering her knees. A totally bare body sullied with lots of dust.
A dark race with black tousled mop of hair, also filled with dust and
surely with lice. Yellow snot trickling out from nose which she tried
to slick in every time. Hearing her words and looking at her grimy face
I felt like slapping her cheeks instead. Till I looked down around her
feet, and my child’s heart got riveted there.
‘Oh, what’s all that you have made?’ I peered closely at the clay
figures spread around her small muddied feet. Clay toys she had freshly
made of soft, wet clay from the nearby pond. Artfully decorated with
January-March 2012 :: 77